The following contains spoilers for Sinners, now playing in theatersAmid all the great action, strong performances, and fantastic music, one of Sinners‘ most interesting elements is how it explores the impact of larger bodies of racially charged authority (like the KKK of segregation-era Mississippi) and how empathetic but forced ᴀssimilation can threaten marginalized communities. Sinners is very purposefully set in 1932 and explores a period and region of American history where structural racism wasn’t just the norm, it was often the law.

In Sinners, the cast is almost entirely comprised of people of color (with Mary’s status as a woman who pᴀsses for white has defined her place in town), and forced to contend with threats like the Ku Klux Klan and supernatural monsters like the vampire Remmick. In the process, the film makes a clear distinction and empathizes on some level with Remmick even as it portrays him as a monster. The thematic societal undercurrent of Sinners‘s ending makes the conclusion of the film all the more impressive and compelling.

Sinners’ Overarching Villains Aren’t The Vampires

Sinners Treats The KKK As More Detestable Villains Than The Vampires

While Remmick may want to temporarily kill the heroes, he doesn’t bear them any hatred. This is in direct contrast to Hogwood, the man who sold Smoke and Stack the building in the first place. Secretly the leader of the local Ku Klux Klan chapter, Hogwood and his men had been planning to attack the juke joint and kill everyone present. Remmick discovered this after using the prejudice against the local Native Americans possessed by one of Hogwood’s men to escape the Choctaw hunters who were chasing after him. In the process, he learned of their plans and was disgusted by them.

It’s a harsh rebuke of hateful mentality that even genuine monsters are disgusted by these kinds of beliefs. While the vampires are the primary threat, Hogwood and his men are notably the final enemies of the film. While Remmick’s death is a moment of desperation and hope, Smoke’s mᴀssacre of the attacking KKK is treated as a much more cathartic conclusion to the film. The vampires are the antagonists, but the forces that seek to displace and destroy communities for the crime of merely existing are the real villains.

Remmick’s Origins Give Him A Tragic Connection To Sinners’ Heroes

Remmick Has Empathy For Sinners’ Heroes

One of the most interesting elements of Remmick as a villain is the empathy he shares with Smoke and Stack. Remmick’s origins are only hinted at in the film, but the vampire suggests that his pagan family was among those driven from Ireland in the 5th century by the arrival of Christians. He has personal experience with prejudice and having his culture be ᴀssimilated and erased, and openly notes their shared frustrations with the limitations placed on them because of their ethnicity.

The film reinforces the unspoken and racist-coded laws of the time, with harsh realities like sharecropping and fears of retribution from the authorities creating a stark difference between the different sides of the local town. Both Smoke and Stack repeatedly reference the Jim Crow laws that were in place at the time of the film’s plot, and subtle touches of the movie underscore the difficulties facing people of color in this era. In that sense, Remmick is a refreshing breath of fresh air. He sees his victims as people and potential brothers, unlike the murderers in the KKK.

Regardless of their ethnicity, Remmick sees all his targets as potential new converts for a tribe that looks beyond those elements. He doesn’t treat Sammie with any disrespect or dismissal. He recognizes Sammie as a gifted musician, which is why he decided to target them in the first place. His desire to have a community that feels free and connected serves as a dark reflection of Smoke and Stack’s own mission to create a space for their community. Smoke even briefly seems tempted, underscoring the effectiveness of Remmick’s appeal.

Remmick’s Culture Risks Overtaking Smoke & Stack

Remmick Wants To Absorb Sammie And The Others Into His Culture

However, Remmick’s efforts to convert others to his way of life can also be seen as a metaphor for ᴀssimilation. While the locals may become immortal through their new vampiric side, they are connected through Remmick’s mind and memories. All of those connections set off a mᴀssive performance of “Will Ye Go, Lᴀssie Go?, also known as “Wild Irish Thyme,” a classic Irish/Scottish ballad that Remmick sings almost as a response to Sammie’s earlier one-take performance in Sinners of “I Lied To You.” In this scene, all the now vampiric patrons of the juke joint, including Mary, Stack, and Cornbread, are shown dancing in perfect sync with the song.

Unlike the wild and free dancing of generations called upon by Sammie, Remmick forces his new converts to recreate his own songs in perfect harmony — and because of his supernatural influence, it’s impossible to know how much agency they actually have in that moment or if they’re being forced to relive his past. By bringing them into his tribe, Remmick effortlessly recreates his own culture and music over them and through them.

It’s a darkly fascinating concept, especially as it speaks to his desire to steal Sammie’s life and claim his musical ability for his own ends. It’s a dark realization of an earlier comment in the movie when Sammie and Delta Slim were discussing the blues and how white people enjoyed the music created by Black people, but don’t respect or care for the artist behind it. Remmick’s desire to ᴀssimilate Sammie into his culture would override his own deep love for the blues.

It would be a more extreme version of what his father and Smoke told him to abandon the music that connects him to the world around him. It’s two characters, representatives of two very different cultures that both know the pain of marginalization and violence, ʙuттing against each other while the forces that targeted them both prepare to mᴀssacre innocents. This is why it’s important to show how Remmick is dangerous, but Hogwood and the forces he represents are the true villains of the story.

Sinners Embraces The Past, The Present, And The Future

The Post-Credits Scene Of Sinners Reinforces The Film’s Themes

All of this blends together to make the post-credits scene of Sinners especially effective. Decades after the events of the plot, an aged Sammie is visited in Chicago by Stack and Mary. Based on their fashions and easy confidence stepping into a bar in 1992, they’ve effectively changed to keep up with the times. Their clothes, jewelry, and behavior suggest they’ve adjusted to the decade just as well as they’ve embraced their vampiric states. However, Stack is still moved by Sammie’s performance of “Travelin’,” recalling how it connects him to the family and friends he lost that day.

Through Remmick, Sinners references the different kinds of persecution that have existed in human history, and how it can end up pitting people against one another. The film features examples of immigrants from around the world, such as neighbors (like the Chows) and invaders (like Remmick). It’s notable, then, that this is Mary and Stack’s happy ending, together and endless in their exploration of a different world that’s changed plenty in just the few decades since Sammie last saw them.

They’ve adjusted instead of being ᴀssimilated, retaining the “gifts” they got from a now long-ᴅᴇᴀᴅ European while staying true to themselves and their own cultural roots. Similar to the way that music is portrayed as a way to bridge the gap between generations, Stack and Mary have found a way to endure forces like the KKK and even the changing society to flourish. Sinners has a lot going on under the surface, and its subtle exploration of society makes the delightfully bombastic final shootout all the more emotionally and thematically resonant.